Escape from Caprica
by Timbo
Summary: Starbuck’s found the arrow, as well as Helo & Boomer. Now What?


Rating: PG-13 for language, violence. K/L friendly but as Lee isn't in this story until they get back to Galactica…

Archive: BSG2003 ok, others please ask

Summary: Starbuck's found the arrow, as well as Helo Boomer. Now What?

Disclaimer: I don't own em', universal does. Don't sue! Thanks go out to my lovely and talented beta readers Kylen and Anacalime – Thanks Ladies!

Part 1: Escape from Caprica

"Starbuck? C'Mon Starbuck, you need to get up, we have to leave!" Helo's insistent voice and hands tugging her up by her armpits brought Kara Thrace back from the edge of a very dark place. The events of the past fifty-one days had finally caught up with her, and part of her just wanted to stay there to die. _Leave me alone Helo._

"Starbuck!" Helo had her up now, pushed back against the column and had taken her face in his hands "Snap out of it! We have to get out of here and back to _Galactica_. I can't do that without you, Kara, you're the only one who knows how to get us back."

_Get Back…the Arrow…_ "The Arrow!" Kara forced herself to stand straight, and winced "Ow…Frackin' Hell!" She had a mission to complete, and Kara Thrace hated not finishing what she started.

Her side hurt, her face hurt. Frak, everything hurt a little. _That was a long way to fall…damn I'm lucky. Won't be flying for a few days but it is better than being dead._

"The Arrow," Helo repeated, his earlier grin reappearing, though somewhat confused "Glad to see you're waking up. What about the arrow?"

Kara pushed him away and stumbled towards the dead Cylon. She nearly fell back on top of it, but managed to get a hand down on the ground and quickly pushed herself up. The Rebar that had killed the Cylon stuck out from its body a good six inches, and Kara shuddered. _If I'd been lying directly on top of it, the rebar would have impaled me too. Wham. No more Starbuck. _ She closed her eyes and took a moment to try and clear the image from her brain, then reached over the corpse for the arrow. "This had better be worth it," she muttered.

"It is."

She could hear the sound of someone moving down from the floor above, and a few heartbeats later Sharon's twin warily moved into her field of vision.

"It will show us the way to Earth." The Cylon continued.

Kara nodded, and took in a deep breath and coughed from the effort. Helo trusted it. She would have to do the same for now.

_Frakking Cylon. Sharon is a Cylon. OhGodsOhGods…_ Kara forced the panic and despair back down, she had a mission to finish. Damned if she wouldn't do it too. She forced herself up, keeping one eye on the Cylon as she did so.

It made no moves towards her, and actually looked afraid in that vulnerable way Sharon always had. _Pregnant huh?_ Kara always suspected Helo had a soft spot for Sharon, but she hadn't realized it'd gone that far. _Hello pot, meet kettle. You can't exactly throw stones in the relationship department, can you Kara? Not when you call out your best friend's name when you have sex with someone else._

She sighed and shook her head at the situation in general and whole idea of a pregnant Cylon in particular._ Still, **that** will be one hell of story, Helo – How I Knocked Up a Toaster by Karl Agathon. _

"You ready to blow this joint?" she asked him as he moved to her side, glancing from her to Sharon's twin nervously. "Relax, Helo. You say she lives then she lives, for now."

Helo let out a breath and handed her pistol to her, he must have gone back for it when she was focused on the arrow. She slipped it into her holster and relaxed ever so slightly. It hadn't seemed to help her much upstairs earlier, but it felt good just the same.

"The others will know we're here." Not-Sharon said "We need to be gone before they arrive."

Kara nodded again, "Right. I need to get to my ride first, there's something in there we might need." The raider clearly wasn't big enough for her and Helo both, and something told her he'd want to bring the toaster along with him.

-

"That was unexpected." Doral commented, observing the impaled corpse of his female colleague with an indifferent expression from the edge of the museum's main floor "Humans are surprising creatures; just when you think you've learned everything about them, they do something you do not expect."

"I shouldn't have dragged it out" His female companion responded, annoyed, as she moved to stand beside him.

"You do seem to have something personal against this Lt. Thrace. I would have snapped her neck and been done with it." He turned to face her "Are you jealous that she was able to make your pet human feel something for her where you failed to do the same?"

"It is personal," she agreed, "but not for that reason. She deserved a slow and painful death for the abomination that brought her here, the woman is a distraction to Gaius and menace to us in general."

They turned as one and made their way back through the museum to the outer courtyard, where the raider sat seemingly untouched. Their robotic brethren could be heard moving about, searching nearby buildings for signs of the traitor and her human companions. The rain had started pouring down again, erasing any signs of their passage through the area, no clue remained where they had gone.

"It is my own fault," she continued, "I should have killed her immediately. She made Gaius turn away from us, if even for an instant. That cannot be forgiven or allowed to happen again."

"You place too much faith in your pet human," her companion chided, "but no matter. God will reveal all in time. They still have to find a way off-planet, and we know where they will go eventually. We'll find them."

"When we find them this time, we must kill the humans," she urged, "The male has served his purpose and the female is of no use to us."

"No," her companion responded, "God has not revealed all, but this much is clear: The female human is meant to return to Galactica, with the arrow. Her part in this is more than what it seems, though exactly what that is has not been revealed. God will tell us when we need to know."

She visibly did not like that response, but said nothing as they moved down the steps towards the recaptured raider and their robotic brethren.

"The stink of the humans infects this one." She placed a hand on the surface of the craft and slowly stroked it with a mournful expression. "The body lives but the soul is gone."

Her companion nodded. "We will need to inspect it to see what the humans have done to it, what they have learned. Then it must be purified so it may rest with God." He knelt underneath to get at the access hatch, and pressed the button.

-

Kara paused momentarily along with Helo and "Sharon" as the distinct rumble of an explosion echoed through the concrete and steel canyons of downtown Delphi, and a bittersweet smile came to her face. "At least one less toaster to worry about" she said brightly to her companions. She'd miss her "pet goat" but there really hadn't been any other choice. They'd had little time to waste: she couldn't let the modifications fall into Cylon hands and she was in no condition to fly. Frak, she was partly amazed she could still walk after that beating the blond Cylon bitch had inflicted on her. _The Bitch got hers though_, she thought viciously, _pity she won't really be dead._

"Good thinking Starbuck," Helo told her, a mix of admiration and amazement in his expression. "I still can't quite believe you managed to fly that thing in the first place."

"Sharon" had a pained expression on it's face, as if it couldn't make up its mind to agree with Helo or be upset that more of its kind were dead. Kara really didn't give a frak as long as the toaster stayed where she could see it.

"Yeah, well, what can I say?" Kara grinned back "If it can fly, I can drive it." She studied her nails nonchalantly. "I'm good at this business." Her expression turned serious, "Though I wouldn't have been able to leave that little treat for the toasters if you hadn't given me the last of your G4."

"What are friends for?" he stopped and studied her "Speaking of friends, you ready for a break? Your limp is getting worse."

Kara grimaced, she'd been so focused on putting distance between them and the museum she hadn't paid attention to the throbbing in her bum leg and other assorted aches and pains. Now that Helo had mentioned it she swore she could ID at least fifteen different spots that could definitely use a little TLC. "A break sounds good, we probably ought to wait until dark to get any closer to the spaceport anyway." She surveyed the area and pointed up ahead a block or so towards the entrance to a tube station. "How about there?"

Helo observed their surroundings with a wariness she hadn't seen in him the last time they'd seen each other. "It'll do." He pronounced, nodding before looking over to the Cylon, who nodded its consent as well.

He led the way, sprinting towards the entrance, followed closely by the Cylon. Kara waited until they had reached the entrance safely and followed, trying as they did to spend as little time exposed as possible.

After they were down the stairs and on the platform, Helo stated that he'd pull first watch and took a position by the foot of the stairs. The Cylon huddled close by him, as if it were afraid to let him out of its sight. Kara told him to come get her in an hour and she'd take next watch, then continued further back into the station and put her back against one of the support columns before sliding down to the floor. _Gods it's good to be out of that Frakin' rain. It never rained this much before the war- damned Cylons. _She'd take a little nap and try to warm up and dry out a bit, afterwards she could quiz Helo and the Cylon about transport off this mudball. _This isn't home anymore; _She realized sadly, _Galactica and the fleet are home now._

-

The sound of thunder startled Kara from a sound sleep and for a split second she didn't know where she was. She looked about wildly for several heartbeats before recognition came and she started calming down… the events of the past day fresh in her mind along with the assorted physical aches and bruises. Damn, and she'd been having such a pleasant dream involving a certain pilot and a hot shower…

She immediately reached out to her side and relaxed when she felt the backpack. Without its contents they would be truly frakked if they actually were able to steal a ship to get off the planet. The arrow, Cylon transponder and Colonial IFF transponder were vital to their survival and she didn't intend to let anything happen to them.

Looking up, she could see rain violently pounding the transparent ceiling of the tube station in thick sheets. It looked like an extremely nasty storm out, and she was glad to at least be out of the rain, if not exactly dry and warm.

Several hours had passed since she'd dozed off. The sky was pitch black, darker than it would be if it were merely rain. _Where's Helo? He should have gotten me up for the next watch…_

Kara stood and stretched, taking a moment to inventory the various aches and pains she'd accumulated in the past 24 hours. _Ow! Frak! Sunuvabitch that smarts._ _Here I thought I was sore **before **I went to sleep! Still, I was –damn- lucky I didn't break anything in the fall, at least nothing feels broken anyway_. She grabbed her weapons belt and backpack before setting off, and it took only a moment to spot Helo at the foot of the stairs. He was talking softly with the Cylon and not paying much attention to what was going on around them.

Kara stalked towards them, when she got to within ten feet and they hadn't seen her she called out sarcastically "Is this a private conversation kiddies, or can anyone join?"

They started, and looked up towards her with guilty expressions on their faces.

She was still damp from their run in the rain, sore from the fight, hungry, and generally in a foul mood. Seeing Helo distracted from his responsibility to keep watch (by a frakking pregnant Cylon of all things!) sent her right over the edge.

Something in her expression must have given her away, as Helo jumped up as she came up to them "Hey Starbuck," he greeted her nervously, "Sharon and I were just discussing our options on getting to the spaceport. She thinks we've got a pretty good chance of getting something that can get us to Galactica."

"Oh 'she' does, does 'she'?" Kara said, a dangerous glint in her eye "Helo, why didn't you wake me to relieve you on the watch?"

"Um, you looked like you needed the rest and I wasn't tired so I thought I'd let you sleep." Helo's expression said he knew he was treading on dangerous ground; he'd been around her long enough to know when she was truly pissed.

Kara's eyebrows raised practically to her hairline "First off, I don't care if you were tired or I needed sleep, you should have gotten me up. Second, that is –not- Sharon. 'Sharon' never existed in the first place!"

"I'm right here you know," the Cylon interjected, annoyed. "When the frak did you become all holier than thou, Star-" it stopped in mid-sentence when Kara stuffed her service pistol in its face.

"I don't recall giving you permission to speak, toaster." She said calmly.

"Kara!" Helo moved to disarm her, but stopped when she cocked the hammer.

"Back off Helo, the machine and I need to come to an understanding." She didn't take her eyes off the toaster, but she saw him back down out of her peripheral vision.

"Let's get one thing straight," she told the Cylon. "You and I are not friends. We have never been friends. You are a machine who pretended to be my friend in order to help your fellow machines destroy my species. If you ever try to act like you know me again, I will blow your head off. I don't give a frak whether you've got a bun in your oven or not."

She looked the machine dead in the eye. "All I want from you is a way off this frakked up world so I can warn the fleet about your counterpart on Galactica and get the arrow back to them. Understand?"

The Cylon nodded, though it looked absolutely devastated and tears were running down its face. _I don't care. This is NOT Sharon. Sharon, for all intents and purposes, died on Judgment Day._

"Good." Kara lowered her pistol. "Now, let's talk about the spaceport…"

-

"I don't like it," Kara groused as she handed the binoculars to Helo. "They have to know we'd be coming here. Why isn't there more security?"

Helo shrugged as he brought the binoculars up to his eyes and studied the landing field "Dunno. The patrols _do _seem awfully light to me." He lowered the binoculars and turned to 'Sharon.' "What do you think?"

The Cylon gestured helplessly "I don't have an answer either. I think more like a human than a Cylon, it's the way I was originally programmed and it's only gotten stronger the more I associate with humans. It could be they think we've run out of anti-radiation meds, that we decided to try a different part of the planet, or they just don't consider us much of a threat."

Kara rolled her eyes. "Right. It smells like a trap to me, but we really don't have much choice in the matter" She tapped Helo on the shoulder. "Hand me the field glasses again."

It'd been nearly a week since she'd landed on Caprica, and Kara was becoming more anxious by the hour: The fleet wouldn't stay in one spot forever, and every minute she stayed here made it less likely she'd find them when she jumped back. They had a day's worth of anti-radiation meds left and had used up the last of their food this morning. In short, it was now or never.

She turned the field glasses back towards the landing field. From their vantage point on the top floor of one of the barracks they had an excellent view of the entire strip. Here and there were a few burned out husks of colonial spacecraft, but her attention was focused on the many Cylon ships lined neatly on the tarmac. Some were the same familiar design as her recently departed pet goat, but most were larger, of a design she hadn't seen before. "What are those things?" She asked the Cylon, pointing towards one of the new ships. With a long and narrow fuselage, and a lack of obvious weapons, she figured it had to be a transport.

"It's a transport ship - it can carry cargo or troops and allow combat drops."

"Do they have the same sort of range as the raiders?" Kara asked intently. She still didn't like the idea of having a Cylon around, but right now it was handy for getting intel.

"Yes, but they're unarmed and slow as sin."

Kara frowned, her mind racing. _It might work…then again I don't have anything to lose at this point. If it doesn't work we're all dead anyway. _ "It'll have to do," she said, nodding decisively "Can we enter the jump coordinates ourselves? If not we're frakked."

The Cylon smiled "Leave that to me, I can interface with the FTL system. Just give me the coordinates and I'll get us there."

Kara didn't like the way that sounded, but the Cylon had been honest with them so far. If it had wanted to betray them it could easily have done so at any time. Still…

"All right, I'll give you the coordinates once we're up and out of the gravity well. Helo? You ok with this?"

He grinned at her. "Starbuck, just say the word. I want off this frakking planet more than anything else right now."

"All right, then listen up. This is what we do…"  
-  
"This was too easy!" Kara complained as she concentrated on flying the transport. _Damn thing handles like a crate!_ They had left the atmosphere and she was doing her best to stay on the other side of the planet from the Basestars in orbit around Caprica. A few more minutes and they would be out of the gravity well and on their way to the fleet. She had trust in the Cylon transponder, but she didn't want to press her luck.

"Since when are we complaining about something being easy for a change?" Helo shot back. "Why question a gift from the Gods Starbuck?"

"I don't know Helo, it just doesn't seem hard enough."

"We've cleared the gravity well" 'Sharon' announced.

_Decision time Kara. Go back to Galactica with the toaster in tow or jump somewhere else and die. Frak it! The Cylons were already at Kobol when I left so I don't have anything to lose. _ She rattled off the jump coordinates and watched the Cylon silently interact with the transport. _Damn that's creepy._

_Lords of Kobol hear my prayer! Help us make it home alive…_

"Jump!"

-

"They jumped" Doral turned away from the Dradis screen and looked to his companions.

"I hope you know what you're doing" Six told him.

"It is as God wills."

-

Edited 2/5/05 to restore scene breaks


End file.
